Those that have seen him around at events can attest that this guy is rarely in a bad mood – always goofing around with his teammates and those around him while showing pride in his appearance by typically dressing up in a sport where most typically dress down.
It’s safe to say that Eric is seemingly one of the most amiable and easygoing people around.
You’d never guess that behind it all is a lot of pain, a lot of rage that’s had to be harnessed over time.
“I lost both my parents by the age of 19,” he says. His father died in 1997 and his mother died in 2005. Not knowing how to deal with the loss and cope with it all, he fell into a destructive lifestyle that included drugs and alcohol.
You don’t know what low is until you’ve hit bottom with nowhere to go next but up.
Finding himself in that dark place, Eric turned to scripture. Through a young man from his church, he eventually found mixed martial arts as well.
It’s helped harness a lot of his rage. In many ways, just being in the gym exerting energy with teammates has been just the type of therapeutic environment the doctor ordered.
“I’m going into my fourth year of training now and I’ve been at Silverback (Fight Club) since December 2010. (Coach) Tony Orozco has been my mentor and father figure. Since I’ve been training with Pops (Orozco), BJJ, MMA, and life finally make sense. He always says how you train is how you fight. And a lot of times, how you fight and persevere is how you live.”
“I think one of the main things I’ve learned through this time is this thing called perseverance. I haven’t won every time I’ve gone out and fought (his current record is 2-2) and I’ve even felt like I’ve been robbed before but I just have to keep on going. In my last fight, I fractured my ankle in the first thirty seconds of the fight but I kept on going. Pops kept pushing me to get that win so I did.”
He’ll face his latest test in the cage next Friday at Cage Combat 10 when he takes on Gracie Barra Katy’s Chris Sutton – another prospect currently undefeated at 1-0.
“I want to come out victorious so I can be considered to fight for that Garcia Promotions 185 belt, he says. “I’ve been working hard with my gorillas and I’ve put in blood, sweat, and tears to get ready for this one. This is going to be an action-packed display of MMA. No matter what happens, I plan to survive.”
Fighter Acknowledgments
First and foremost, I would like to thank Jehovah God who made it possible for me to train hard without getting physical injured. Thanks to my family and my church (Hiram Clarke M.B.C.). I also want to say thank you to my Silverback family too. To my pops Tony, Scotty, John “Chile” Rodriguez, lil’ Tony, Ben,Kolton, JT, “The Black Beast”, Daivd, Jacob, Kolton, Romiro, Leroy, ACE, Skinny, Christina V, Drake, Patrice, Shanice, Kim Patterson,Twinky,Courtney, Danyalle G, Danielle C. Stephanie, Liza,Nelly and to all my fans and of course to TXMMA. – Eric Thompson